It seems like food is the center of everything in this world. Maybe I just pay more attention to it because Brooklyn can’t just eat food freely without knowing every ingredient. Next week they are having a Thanksgiving Pot Luck for the first graders at her school. They are doing it after lunch. I have 2 issues with this, #1 - It’s another thing that Brooklyn can’t participate in because its food related and # 2- Why are they feeding the kids more food right after they just ate lunch?
There are other programs at school that are all based on food. The “Box Tops” program is a fundraiser for the schools. But most of products that you find Box Tops on are highly processed, full of sugar, not good for your kid, food like substances. They pressure the kids to collect these Box Tops and even turn it into a contest.
Here is the contest going on at Brooklyn's school. She is constantly on me about collecting them because the school is on her about it.
Another school program is “Book It” by Pizza Hut. The kids record what they read and at the end of the month they get a coupon for a free Personal Pan Pizza, if they read enough books. I wrote a letter to the “Book It” program asking them if they ever thought about alternative rewards for children with food allergies, so I will post the letter and response when or if I get one.Why does everything have to have a food reward? It’s not a surprise to me that the US has one of the highest rates of OBESITY in children. Everything is food, food, food. And processed food at that. Check out this list of food events in schools on a food allergy forum called “Food Allergy Support”. The list is called: Food in Schools-Working List Eye-opener. It is an eye-opener for sure!
Again, here is the link to that food allergy forum. Lets come together to come up with solutions!
Can you think of other ways to reward our children other than food? And does anyone have suggestions about introducing non-food reward programs into our schools?
Activities are a great way to reward children, and, depending on the activity, the activitiy can provide a reward that is healthy, creative, and educational. Trips to museums, climbing walls, extra recess time, and crafting would be great. Also, what about having children earn the opportunity to mentor other kids. This was something that I always looked forward to when I was in grade school - if I performed well, I was able to go help younger kids with math or classroom activities. And by the way, food was never used as a reward when I was in school.
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